Convicted Pilot Flying J fraudster Heather Jones is continuing to try to block the public airing of racist recordings of her former boss, even though she knew nothing about the “vulgar” commentary.

Jones, a former account representative, was convicted last week of plotting with her ex-boss, former Pilot Flying J President Mark Hazelwood, and a slew of other executives and staffers at the nation’s largest diesel fuel retailer to rip off trucking companies and boost Pilot Flying J’s market share and profits.

Hazelwood also was convicted at the same U.S. District Court trial of conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud as well as separate crimes of wire fraud and witness tampering, in connection with a five-year scheme at the truck stop giant to lure truckers into doing business with Pilot Flying J with discounts on diesel fuel and then shortchanging them.

In that trial, prosecutors Trey Hamilton and David Lewen played snippets of recordings secretly made by a mole sales executive at a meeting of Hazelwood and his salesmen in October 2012 in which Hazelwood used racial epithets, asked his team to play a racist and misogynistic country song, mocked his boss’s football team and its fans, and mocked members of his firm’s board of directors.

Jones was not at that meeting. She is not on the recording. But her defense attorney, Cullen Wojcik, is renewing a push to block from the public the entirety of those recordings and transcripts related to it.

USA TODAY NETWORK - Tennessee, joined by several media organizations, launched a battle in December for public access to the documents and recordings. Those records and recordings — along with transcripts of hearings Judge Curtis Collier held in secret in chambers about them — will lay the foundation for Hazelwood’s appeal of his convictions.

Hazelwood's lead defense attorney, Rusty Hardin, has publicly said he will attack on appeal Collier’s ruling on allowing snippets of those recordings to be played as part of the trial.

Public access, public scrutiny

News Sentinel attorney Richard Hollow addresses his closing statements to members of the jury during a 2007 case.(Photo: News Sentinel)

USA TODAY NETWORK - Tennessee and media partners — The Plain Dealer in Cleveland, Ohio, the Chattanooga Times Free Press, WBIR-TV in Knoxville and WKYC-TV in Cleveland — argued via attorney Richard Hollow the public has no way to judge the legal soundness of Collier’s decision without access to the complete record of the case.

Hollow noted that public interest is high in how the judicial system handled a case that involved a multi-billion dollar company headed by the owner of a football team — Pilot Flying J CEO and Cleveland Browns owner Jimmy Haslam.

Haslam denies knowledge of the fraud scheme and is not charged. Prosecutors have not designated him a target of the investigation.

Pilot Flying J’s board of directors has admitted criminal responsibility for the crimes of 18 of its former employees, including Hazelwood, and paid out $92 million in criminal penalties and $85 million in lawsuit settlements. The firm is still making payments to Hazelwood, though he was discharged in May 2014, more than a year after authorities raided Pilot Flying J’s headquarters in Knoxville.

The company said in a statement it was an honoring an employment agreement by paying Hazelwood a total of $40 million since his dismissal, with $6 million of that flowing into his bank account one month before he faces sentencing before Collier.

'Crescendo' of attention

Wojcik contends it doesn’t matter that jurors were told Jones wasn’t at the meeting during the racist commentary and specifically instructed not to hold the racist remarks of Hazelwood and the other sales executives against her. She still has a stake in whether the public gets full access to the court record, he wrote.

“Ms. Jones is currently exploring her options to appeal her conviction,” he wrote. “Should such an appeal be successful, Ms. Jones will face a certainly tainted jury pool. The media’s coverage of this trial has continued unabated reaching its crescendo with numerous reporters and television cameras awaiting the Defendants outside the courthouse at the conclusion of the trial.

“If these incendiary recordings are released for the media to copy and air, the coverage of this matter will surely increase both in duration and intensity,” he wrote.

U.S. District Judge Curtis L. Collier(Photo: Submitted)

Wojcik said Jones was not seeking a permanent sealing of the records, though.

Hazelwood’s defense team objected during the trial to the release of the records sought on behalf of the public but hasn’t sought to renew those objections since he was convicted.

Hazelwood is facing at least two decades behind bars. U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Guyton last week ordered him placed under house arrest in his Cherokee Boulevard home — which was posted as bond collateral — outfitted with an ankle monitor, and his private jet disabled by his full-time pilot.

Collier has not issued a ruling yet on the request by the media organizations for public access to sealed records and recordings or given an indication on when he will.